If Trump's Health Secretary Gets What He Wants, Women Could Have to Pay More than Men for Health Insurance

President-elect Donald Trump has tapped Georgia Rep. Tom Price to be secretary of health and human services in his new administration. The former orthopedic surgeon has been a tireless opponent of the Affordable Care Act since it passed in 2012. Come January 21, he'll have some power to enact his plan to repeal and replace it.

Given that Price has earned zeroes across the board from the Human Rights Campaign and Planned Parenthood, his nomination should terrify women who care for their uteruses and their reproductive freedom. But worse still, perhaps, is his apparent conviction that women should suffer for the mere offense of their existence.

As New York Magazineoutlines, Price opposes free birth control and doesn't believe that "one woman" wouldn't be able to afford it if the stipulation in Obamacare that keeps it free were to be eliminated. But the Atlantic explains that millions of women struggled to afford birth control until Obamacare made it available. And the magazine went further, adding that the "rapid decline" in teen pregnancies is widely attributed to "the proliferation of free long-term reversible contraceptives, which can cost hundreds of dollars if not covered by insurance."

Price is so opposed to women's bodily autonomy (ergo freedom) that he thinks employers should be allowed to fire women if they exercise it. In 2015, he opposed a nondiscrimination bill that would have barred bosses from firing workers for using birth control or having an abortion. And that same year, he introduced a budget reconciliation bill that would have repealed Obama's health law and defunded Planned Parenthood in one fell swoop.

And if Price sees to it that Trump ditches Obamacare or rewrites it, much more is at stake for women. Before Obama passed the ACA, insurers didn't have to charge men and women the same rates for the same services. They could make people pay copays or deductibles for preventive services, which meant that women would have to pony up for breast and cervical cancer screenings and testing for the BRCA 1 and 2 genetic mutations that increase women's risk of breast cancer even though the earlier women can treat these diseases, the smaller their overall financial burden will be. And until the ACA was enacted, insurance plans didn't have to cover prenatal care or childbirth. Under Obamacare, those services are considered one of "10 essential health benefits." All this isn't some nice nod to ladies. Cervical cancer and breast cancer can be treated, if detected early. NPR cited a study from 2010 in which the total payment for a vaginal birth was $18,329. These numbers add up.

Price has spent six years trying to gut Obamacare and it decades hating women's freedom. So, what's it going to cost you to be a woman under his leadership? If you've made it this far, it's already too high. Under Price, get ready to pay more.

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